After my recent short walk I have 3 16Gb SD cards full of photos, which I moved to my computer with MultiComander. The first two cards went flawlessly, but I've run into dreadful issues with the third, where the images are corrupt. Well, corrupt on the first copy/move (mostly).

What I did, which is what I've always done (maybe not any more though ), is to move the files from the card to the computer. Some of the moved files ended up like this (reduced): Experts opinion on very odd Camera -> Card -> File Copy corruptions. The regularity of a file being corrupted increased during the move opperation (that is, it was maybe 1 in 20 at the beginning and 1 in 3 at the end). I may attach other examples, but some of them look they have multiple layers overwritten with mismatched origin points (ie offset). I used EASEUS Data Recovery Wizard 5.0.1 to recover the deleted (when moved) files, and mostly they seem to be OK: Experts opinion on very odd Camera -> Card -> File Copy corruptions. But sometimes the files are also corrupt on the card, iterestingly mostly different to the file that was moved, but the same as what was recovered. I also tried Recuva, but Recuva found 3169 files as Easeus found 9442 files, which seemed to give me greater ability to find a non-currupted file. BUT, what is also extremely odd is that sometimes the recovered file on the HDD is not the same as what is on the card, and when recovered individually.

Now, what that implies to me is:

The original move produced some corrupted files. Caused by?

MultiCommander?

Windows?

Hard Drive?

The camera wrote corrupted files.

Bad Card? But it's not consistent?

Naughty camera? It's not the most perfect environment for a camera in the hot and cold, sometimes rain, and jolted when I fell over... But the timing of the corrupt files doesn't correspond with any of those events.

The recovered files may not have been the final file the camera wrote? Maybe the camera used the card as a temporary storage when combining images?

The recovered files are not named the same as what was moved, so I'm not sure what that means?

If a JPEG expert is interested they can access the original, non-reduced, files for comparison here (warning - they are large files). When I edited them with IrfanView (eg to resize), IrfanView would complain that the file format was corrupt: extra data where it shouldn't be, or missing data; which to me sounds like the file has been written incorrectly (either by camera or software during the copy):

I'm going through, slowly, and re-copying them when necessary and I think that in the end I should not have lost very many images (though with 9,500 I can afford to lose some and not be too upset ), but the why of this problem is troubling me... anyone with any ideas?

The main lesson I learned is that Move as a file action is not the best idea when there are lots of files and it may be best to check first before removing them from the origin location (but in my defense: this is the first time that something like this has ever happened).

Sorry to hear this - and after such a great adventure. It's a harsh lesson but "copying" from one location to another is the only way; maybe even treating the original cards as permanent media rather than something you can reuse. That's all in hindsight though.

I'd also blame the card(s), i.e. I've seen it happen and assumed it was the card so threw it away - then not had the problem arise again. I convinced myself this was due to putting the card in my back pocket - did you store the cards in a less than perfect way?

Sorry to hear this - and after such a great adventure. It's a harsh lesson but "copying" from one location to another is the only way; maybe even treating the original cards as permanent media rather than something you can reuse. That's all in hindsight though.

It was only 1 16Gb card (of 3), and not every image on the card -- it's quite random... and actually, only mainly evident on copied files once they get onto the HDD (and even then not every time for the same file)... which made me wonder about the software: so I'm generally able to copy them off again without too many issues (apart from time).

I'd also blame the card(s), i.e. I've seen it happen and assumed it was the card so threw it away - then not had the problem arise again. I convinced myself this was due to putting the card in my back pocket - did you store the cards in a less than perfect way?

You are joking, right?? Me, do something less than perfect??

Well, seriously... this was such an important walk (for us), that I had the filled cards in their cases, inside a padded bag that was inside a protected pocket of my pack.

And the images that are corrupt on the card, are fairly few... unless the card can affect the file as it's copied off?? I wouldn't have thought that was possible??

Anyway, I've got to get as many rescued before I start any investigation which may overwrite those files and make them unrecoverable permanently

In hope that this might help:You say you moved the image files from "A" to "B" (i.e., from card to computer) - right?Have you been able to prove that the images:are corrupt on "B" (e.g., say by using another image viewer), andare equally corrupt on "A" (e.g., by viewing them in the camera's display)?

Not sure if you have already considered this, but if the image files were deleted on the "A" (card) during the move, they will be relatively easily recoverable/undeleted, unless you have overwritten that card with any data since the move. Just recover them to another device though.

I have had similar difficulties as this in the past, when plugging in camera cards to my laptop. I found that it's safest to use the software that comes with the camera to transfer files to my laptop - either directly from the camera or from the card when it had been inserted into my laptop's car-reader. If I didn't use that software, then I found it could sometimes cause card corruption and the card had to be reformatted in the camera before it could work properly again.

I assumed that the cause of this was possibly due to the camera manufacturers using proprietary formats for their card formatting and sophisticated on-card writing operations in-camera - e.g., when carrying out in-camera image edits.

I am not an expert, but I have seen this error many times, and in my cases it never had to do with the camera or the card. The fact that you were able to recover a perfect example of the same file, should imply the same conclusion. In my situations it was always the transfer itself, the "safe as" or "move to". Of course this particular card may improve from re-formatting, but in general my best bet is, to try a more easy-going "Copy/Move"-program.

I found that it's safest to use the software that comes with the camera to transfer files to my laptop - either directly from the camera or from the card when it had been inserted into my laptop's car-reader.